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This bill would change how the government measures mistakes in SNAP benefit payments and how much states may owe when those mistakes happen. It would make the rules stricter starting in fiscal year 2025, reduce the amount of small errors that can be ignored, and tie part of a state’s penalty to how much of its overpayments it actually gets back. It also says state SNAP agencies should try to recover any extra benefits that were paid out by mistake.
- For fiscal year 2025 and later, the bill would set the “small error” allowance for SNAP payment mistakes at zero, meaning these errors would no longer be automatically ignored in the same way as before.
- It would change how a state’s payment error rate is used to figure out what the state owes, so the penalty could be adjusted based on how much of the overpaid benefits were not recovered.
- The bill would require state agencies to seek repayment of overpaid SNAP benefits from recipients.
- Overall, the goal is to cut down on SNAP payment errors and lower costs for taxpayers.
Official Summaries
Snap Back Inaccurate SNAP Payments Act
This bill requires states to recoup any overpayments of benefits made to Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients and adjusts the formula for determining a state's liability rate for overpayments.
As background, the SNAP quality control system measures how accurately SNAP state agencies determine a household’s eligibility and benefit amount and determines overpayments of benefits and underpayments. States that have comparatively high payment error rates for two consecutive years are assessed a penalty (i.e., liability amount). The Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) must use a statutory formula to determine the liability amount.
Under current law, FNS must set a tolerance level for excluding small payment errors in the calculation of payment error rates (e.g., $56 or less in FY2024). This bill reduces the tolerance level for excluding small errors to $0 for FY2025 and each succeeding fiscal year.
The bill also requires state agencies to recoup any overpayments of benefits made to SNAP beneficiaries.
The bill adjusts the liability rate formula to reduce the state payment error rate based on the percentage of overpayments recouped by the state. Further, the bill increases the multiplier used in the liability rate formula to 25% (from 10%).
Current Full Text
[Congressional Bills 119th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 762 Introduced in House (IH)]
<DOC>
119th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. R. 762
To amend the Food and Nutrition Act of 2008 to improve the calculation
and reduce the taxpayer cost of payment errors under the supplemental
nutrition assistance program, and for other purposes.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
January 28, 2025
Mr. Feenstra (for himself and Mr. Bost) introduced the following bill;
which was referred to the Committee on Agriculture
_______________________________________________________________________
A BILL
To amend the Food and Nutrition Act of 2008 to improve the calculation
and reduce the taxpayer cost of payment errors under the supplemental
nutrition assistance program, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Snap Back Inaccurate SNAP Payments
Act''.
SEC. 2. QUALITY CONTROL SYSTEM TOLERANCE LEVEL FOR EXCLUDING SMALL
ERRORS.
Section 16(c) of the Food and Nutrition Act of 2008 (7 U.S.C.
2025(c)) is amended--
(1) in paragraph (1)--
(A) in subparagraph (A)(ii)--
(i) in subclause (I), by striking ``and''
at the end;
(ii) in subclause (II)--
(I) by inserting ``through fiscal
year 2024'' after ``thereafter''; and
(II) by striking the period at the
end and inserting ``; and''; and
(iii) by adding at the end the following:
``(III) for fiscal year 2025 and
each fiscal year thereafter, $0.'';
(B) in subparagraph (C)--
(i) in the matter preceding clause (i), by
striking ``may'' and inserting ``shall'';
(ii) in clause (ii)(I), by inserting ``, as
adjusted under subparagraph (H), if
applicable'' after ``agency''; and
(iii) in clause (iii), by striking ``10''
and inserting ``25''; and
(C) by adding at the end the following:
``(H) Reduction of payment error rate based on
percentage of overpayments recouped.--In determining
the liability amount of a State agency under
subparagraph (C) for fiscal year 2025 and each fiscal
year thereafter, the payment error rate described in
clause (ii)(I) of that subparagraph shall be equal to
the product obtained by multiplying--
``(i) the payment error rate of the State
agency for that fiscal year; and
``(ii) the percentage of the total amount
of overpayments of benefits made by the State
agency that are not recouped by the State
agency under paragraph (9) for that fiscal
year.'';
(2) by redesignating paragraph (9) as paragraph (10); and
(3) by inserting after paragraph (8) the following:
``(9) Recoupment of overpayments.--Each State agency shall
seek to recoup any overpayments of benefits made to benefit
recipients.''.
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